Peru’s President Pedro Castillo was ousted and arrested on Wednesday, and his Vice President Dina Boluarte was appointed to lead a country accustomed to political crises in a day full of upheaval.

The third impeachment procedure defeated the one who resisted to the end, announcing the dissolution of the parliament that tried to depose him. This time with success.

After assuming office in July 2021, Pedro Castillo, 53, was “arrested,” prosecutor Marita Barreto told the media after the judicial administration published some images showing the former head of state sitting in a chair and surrounded by him. employees of the prosecutor’s office and the police.

A judicial source told AFP that Castillo, who has led the country for just 17 months, was under investigation for “sedition” after he tried to dissolve parliament.

This is in addition to six other corruption or abuse of influence investigations against him, which also accuse members of his family and his political circle.

His dismissal for “moral turpitude”, broadcast live on television, was approved by 101 out of 130 MPs, including 80 from the opposition.

In a last-minute attempt to avoid impeachment again, the former president announced the dissolution of parliament hours before it was due to meet to discuss his fate.

He also announced the establishment of an “emergency government”, a desire to “convene as soon as possible a new Congress endowed with constituent powers to draft a new Constitution”, and declared “the judiciary, the judiciary, the civil service, the National Council of Justice, the Constitutional Court” in “reorganization”. .

The unsupported and therefore fruitless maneuver was quickly labeled a “coup d’état”.

On Wednesday, “a coup d’état took place in the purest style of the 20th century (…) This coup has no legal basis,” said the president of the Constitutional Court, Francisco Morales, stressing that “no one is obliged to obey the usurper.” government”.

Peru’s Attorney General Patricia Benavides rejected “any violation of the constitutional order.”

Independent political analyst Augusto Alvarez told AFP from the start that Pedro Castillo “violated Article 117 of the Peruvian Constitution and is illegal. This is a self-coup.”

During the investiture ceremony in front of the parliament, when she became the first woman president of Peru, Dina Boluarte also repeated that there was a coup d’état attempt, promoted by Pedro Castillo, which did not find an echo in the institutions of democracy or even in the street.

“I take (power) according to the Constitution of Peru, starting from now” until “July 2026″, when Castillo’s term was supposed to expire,” said the 60-year-old lawyer, who comes from the same Marxist family. party (Peru libre), as German.

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered peacefully outside the parliament.

There was an international reaction, especially from America.

The United States immediately announced that it no longer considered Pedro Castillo as acting president of the country, welcoming the role of parliamentarians.

“We will categorically reject any act that violates … any Constitution, any act that undermines democracy,” US State Department spokesman Ned Price said.

Brazil’s president-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said it was “always regrettable that a democratically elected president should suffer this fate”, but expressed satisfaction that “everything was done within the framework of the constitution”.

The Spanish government and Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OSA) Luis Almagro on Wednesday condemned the “disruption of the constitutional order” in the Castillo trials, while Madrid hailed the “restoration of democratic normality”.

Castillo has already avoided two impeachment motions for “moral turpitude” that previously led to the ouster of two sitting presidents, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (right) in 2018 and Martin Vizcarra (center) in 2020, the latter in March. 2022 year.

He was accused, in particular, of repeated ministerial crises and the formation of four governments in eight months, which is an unprecedented event in Peru, sums up AFP.